


Burned, but not Broken

by FrozenWings



Category: Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure (Cartoon)
Genre: Angst, Cass's burned arm, Cassandra Appreciation Week (Disney: Tangled), Character Study, Gen, Introspection, Just me fixating on, Missing Scene, No Plot/Plotless, One Shot, of sorts, set during season 2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-19
Updated: 2021-03-19
Packaged: 2021-03-27 10:54:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,134
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30121677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FrozenWings/pseuds/FrozenWings
Summary: Prompt: Hard times (basically an open invitation to write angst; I love it!)Set roughly one week after 'Rapunzel and the Great Tree,' before the events of 'The Brothers Hook.'After the events at the Great Tree, Cass feels she finally knows what life has in store for her.She wishes she didn't.Really just rated 'T' to be safe.
Relationships: Cassandra & Owl (Disney: Tangled), Cassandra & Rapunzel (Disney: Tangled)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 15





	Burned, but not Broken

**Author's Note:**

> I'm back with another Cassandra-appreciating prompt! And wonder of wonders, it takes place during canon.
> 
> This one was a lot harder to write, and not only because it's been a while since I wrote grown-up Cass. Introspection is tough, especially considering all the complicated emotions poor Cass is going through, and I'm not sure I conveyed her mental state that well here. But in the end, I'm happy with this, and I hope you enjoy it too! Oh, and slight warning: I get kinda graphic about Cass's arm; not too much, but there are still some mentions of blood. If you don't care for that, you may want to skip a paragraph or two.

_“ERRRRGGGGHHHH!!!!!”_

  
The sound tore through the velvety dawn air, causing several birds to abandon their traditional early-morning chorus in favor of frenzied flaps and squawks as Cass, in a swift, angry motion, hurled her bow down to land with a fearful ***thunk*** at her feet, hardly caring if it got scratched or, hell, even broke in two.

Her dad had always preached the importance of taking care of one’s weapons, be they sword, shield, or slingshot (okay, not that last one; her younger self had generalized); throwing them around in a rage certainly did not constitute ‘treating them respectfully.’ But after standing here long enough for the sky’s just-stirring blue to lighten into fresh morning blush, trying and failing to land an arrow in the bulls-eye that was a coin-sized knothole in the tree she was only standing five yards away (a mortifying distance; she hadn’t stood this close since her dad first taught her to shoot), she was ready to snap the uncooperative bow across her knee; throwing it should be considered a victory for self-control.

Besides, she just knew when she saw her dad again, the condition of her weapons stash wouldn’t matter once he saw how well she could now use them.

She stood there, scowling at the uncooperative bow with gritted teeth and murderous gaze that would have no doubt killed the wood if deadwood were a thing that could be killed. Then, with stiff, reluctant movements (No! Not reluctant! She wasn’t afraid to keep trying this! _She wasn’t!_ ), Cass picked up the weapon with her left hand and reached for the quiver resting nearby with her right. Her eyes burned to match the skin protesting under her gauntlet as she tried and failed and tried and failed and tried and failed to pick up the thin wooden shaft, and the bow was almost sent flying to crash against the tree since the arrow, too, was feeling conspiratorial.

“Come on,” she muttered under her breath, sweat beading across her brow, her fingers twitching as they struggled to complete an action she used to be able to do in her sleep.

“Come on…”

The tips grazed the shaft, closed around it with a wince from their owner, and slowly, carefully, started to lift the arrow…

…which wasted no time in dropping back to the ground and rolling a little to rest near a particularly large beetle with a menacing-looking horn thing sprouting from its head, a beetle which proceeded to investigate the arrow and- Oh, _come on!_ \- pick it up by the head and actually drag it away.

Nature was mocking her.

The bow was instantly shrugged to rest on her shoulder to free her biddable hand to snatch the arrow from its emerald-armored thief. “I could crush you, you know,” Cass growled dangerously.

At that the beetle lifted its wings and flew off, the buzzing noise that trailed in its wake sounding like jeering laughs in her ears _(Yeah, sure you_ _could_ ) as it went to land on the trunk of the target-practice tree, clearly not taking her threat seriously and wanting to be further amused by her repeated failures.

Part of Cass wanted to stomp on over there and make that stupid insect regret his silent taunt, but she had more important things to do. Jamming the arrow into her right hand and manually positioning her fingers so they wrapped around it in the proper way (she could work on picking things up and dexterity later), she released a cleansing breath that did absolutely nothing, fitted the arrow into the bow, and pulled back.

  
Everything trembled. Her unpracticed left hand as it struggled to line up her shot and hold it steady; her injured, smarting right as the charred skin and weakened muscles fought to maintain their tenebrous grip on the arrow; her entire right arm as it protested being forced to exert itself in such a manner; and her view of the tree as she shook with tremors coursing beyond her control and anxious breaths at the joint knowledge that it shouldn’t be this hard to shoot an arrow at a target and that everything about this attempt felt a thousand times worse than the countless ones before it.

  
Her right hand screamed, her throat followed suit, and she was forced to let the arrow fly before her left had decided where it wanted it to go.

  
The beetle buzzed off out of the clearing in a drunken, wavering line, unable to contain himself with laughter as the arrow whizzed harmlessly past, missing the tree (and him, drats) entirely. The bow was hurled again, only this time it was chased by a guttural growl that rose in volume and intensity until it was practically a yell.

_NO!_

She missed _again!_ Worse, she hadn’t even come close! Her other arrows had at least either nicked the tree or fallen just short of nicking it; none had gone as wide or flown in a path as crooked as this last blasted one. How was this possible? Why was this happening? You were supposed to get better with practice, not worse! At this rate they’d be back in Corona by the time she could even slot an arrow and hold it steady, hell, _pick up_ a damn arrow without fumbling it, making everyone see how pathetic and clumsy and useless she’d become, and then…and then…

  
Salt.

  
Salt?

  
Cass shook the gauntlet off her unblemished left hand and dashed it across her cheek; it came away wet. She scowled with burning eyes and face, the disgraceful tears only serving to fuel the fire of anger smoldering in her bosom, and a ***clunk*** sound across the isolated clearing as she kicked the bow where it landed nearby, hating herself for being so weak as to actually cry over things (what was wrong with her?!?).

It didn’t go as far as she liked (ergh! She couldn't even do a good job at being angry anymore!), so she stalked towards it, intending to chuck it all the way back to that damn tree where all this started no matter how many tries it took, eyes so intensely trained on it that she didn’t notice the rock jutting out of the ground, searching for a foot to catch on its side and a person to pitch forward so they’d plummet towards the dewy grass, shooting out an arm to catch themselves-

  
_“AAAUUUUUGGGGHHH!!!!”_

  
Why couldn’t her left have volunteered?

  
Cass rolled onto her back from where she’d fallen, clutching her injured arm to her chest, grimacing and in too much pain to care about the tracks being carved down her face by more contemptible tears that _would_ force their way out. Trying to collect herself, she fixed her gaze on some of the puffy pink-tinged clouds dotting the sky as she concentrated on grinding her teeth so she wouldn’t release a third unholy sound to potentially be carried back to the camp on a tattling breeze, sending Eugene or Lance or, worst of all, Rapunzel, out here to find her and fuss and (on the princess’s part) not apologize for everything. Thus far she had managed to keep her early-morning training sessions private, and she’d be damned it anyone found out and bore witness to the sorry sight of her, Cassandra, the Captain’s daughter and the princess’s protector, unable to do something so stupidly simple as pick up an arrow.

A string of _*hoots*_ filled the air, drowning out her pained breaths.

Correction: anyone human.

  
Cass turned away from the annoyingly happy-looking clouds at the sound of rustling feathers as Owl alighted on the grass near her head, golden eyes concerned. “Hey boy,” she breathed, trying to keep her expression neutral though her words were tight with pain.

Her greeting only caused that concerned look to deepen as he hopped closer and, after rubbing his feathery head across her cheek in greeting, stared pointedly at the arm she held against her chest.

“It’s fine,” she said in answer to his silent question. “I just…fell on it.” 

  
He turned to level her with a look that could have made the most hardened of criminals confess their crimes, causing her to mentally kick herself. You’d think it was her brain that'd been fried if she actually thought she could get away with lying to him, doubly so considering the incriminating arrows scattered like pick-up-sticks around the stupid tree. That, and the fact that it seemed nothing happened in the forests surrounding their campsites without him noticing.

  
“Okay, so I was training. Is that a crime?”

  
Owl’s glare narrowed.

  
“I have to! How else is this hand going to re-learn everything? Besides, what else am I supposed to do?”

  
A hoot as firm as any order from her dad to stay the heck in bed when she was sick.

  
“It doesn’t need rest and I _don’t_ need a break!”

  
A scolding one that caused flames to leap in Cass’s eyes, flames that hid something else she refused to admit.

  
“I don't need help, and especially not professional help! I can handle things myself! Me asking for any is _never_ going to happen, so you may as well quit suggesting it!”

  
Owl must have seen the something else, because his expression softened and he flew to perch on Cass’s forehead, bending over so her field of vision was filled with bird. He made a gentle chirring sound, and Cass sighed in defeat.

“Apology accepted,” (at least he understood how to do that even if Her Highness didn’t). “And…" she sighed, looking back and forth between the angrily discarded bow and the gauntleted hand resting on her chest, the one she could feel throbbing and bleeding beneath the metal, "you may have a point. About the break. I guess a one might be a good idea. A short one.”

With that she pushed herself up with her good hand and stood, Owl flapping his wings for balance as he repositioned himself so he could maintain his perch on her head, and struck off towards the babbling brook she’d discovered while scouting the area the evening before. She had been exhausted and her arm had been killing her, but the lethal stare she'd leveled the other members of their party with, one that could freeze the most rambunctious of rushing rivers, precluded anyone from making an offer to the contrary and relieving her of her traditional camp-making task; it was the one job she could still do just as well now as she could....before, and she'd forfeit her best sword before letting anyone take that from her. Besides, it provided an oh-so-convenient excuse to get away from everyone else for a bit, and by 'everyone else' she meant a certain presumptuous blonde.

  
It really was a nice little brook, shaded by willows whose drooping branches whispered encouragements to the water as it tumbled and skipped and laughed along its merry way, the ever-moving current washing the air until it was cool and pure and new, the sort that was just as refreshing to breathe as the water that rendered it thus was to drink. It almost seemed like something out of a fairytale (not that she believed in those...), the sort of place where time didn’t exist and fantastic, wonderful things were just waiting to happen.

Just standing there on its banks caused some of the angry fire to recede, some of her swirling thoughts to slow, and some of the tenseness to flee her muscles, whisked away by the careering brook to be carried far, far away. 

Part of her wished it would carry her away too, far, far away from the traveling party and all the terrible thoughts that filled her shadow now.

  
Owl alighted on a strangely-shaped tree root that arced out of the ground before plunging down to drink straight from the stream (the greedy thing…), and she lowered herself to the damp ground, letting something that wasn’t quite a smile but not a frown either tug at her lips as the peace of the place washed over her.

It really was impossible to feel angry by such a nice stream.

Idly, she let her gaze list about the enchanted place, listening to birdsong and rustling leaves and the endless chatter of the stream as it prattled about everywhere it'd been and the excitement of the unknown where it was heading (something in her stirred at the thought, wishing she could follow it and make the unknown known). Her eyes finally landed on a leaf, swirling about in an endless eddy. The thing was stuck and would likely stay stuck until the rains came and caused the water level to rise, freeing it to go on down the watery highway to who knows where.

She frowned, the peaceful aura surrounding her retreating. The leaf was just like her: stuck in the same endless loop of disappointment and misery and pain, waiting for life to yank her out of the cycle and carry her off to whatever fate it had planned, a fate that was impossible for her to change. Though in this regard, the leaf had it better: it was a brainless leaf that didn’t know where its pre-determined path would lead; she did. She didn’t used to, but she did now, had ever since Rapunzel’s magical stunt last week, and the thought made her sick.

  
The anger started to flame again in spite of the water-chilled air.

Turns out, nothing really was impossible. Lucky her.

  
Shaking her head to try and banish the thought, she concentrated instead on easing off her remaining gauntlet, pausing every few inches to hiss and wince, feeling Owl’s assessing gaze on her the entire time. When the last plate of metal had cleared her fingers (she looked away just in time so she wouldn’t see the raw tips where her nails had actually melted off), she lay down on her stomach just as carefully and dipped the withered appendage into the stream, sighing with relief as the blissfully cool water wrapped around and tenderly stroked charred skin and carried the heat away from the flaming blisters that dotted the black like hideous stars in a too-dark sky. Resting her head on her good arm, she idly stared at the distorted image of her disfigured limb, a few tendrils of blood curling away from the blisters like wisps of smoke from a campfire to dissipate in the current.

_G_ _ood thing there aren't any piranhas here_ , thought, though knowing her luck a school would show up when she was least expecting it. Fortunately her luck held and the only fish that could be seen was an adventurous a minnow. It darted by, a shooting speck of silver, and came to a sudden stop upon sighting her twig-like fingers, occasionally twitching of their own accord, and promptly turned tail and fled back the way it came, possessing the presence of mind to be repulsed by what the arm had become despite being a stupid fish good for little else but bait.

  
A feeling in her gut as dark as what remained of her skin paced uncomfortably, and her frown twisted into a contempt-filled sneer.

  
Shame. That was the only word for it. Everything about that arm was shameful, despicable, abhorrent, and by association so was she. For how could she be anything else? It made her a warrior who couldn’t even draw a bow. It made her an aspiring guard who was unable to draw her sword (she had tried the morning after it happened, and only some of the tears that watered the ground were of physical pain). It made her a lady-in-waiting who, she just knew, could no longer thread a needle or lace a corset and was certainly not fit to be seen in court (which she didn’t mind, court was full of dingbats, but there had been some honor in the position, which was now melted away along with her nails). It made her a woman who could no longer earn her keep, just stand around as idle and pointless as Fitzherbert had been in his first months in the castle, actually worse because at least Rapunzel needed him.

The anger’s pacing quickened.

And though she could hide it out here on the road with only Princess Pushy and the trio of oblivious males for company, the second they tramped back through the gates of Castle Corona, everyone would know it.

  
The forest landscape whose beauty she was ruining by the presence of her arm vanished, replaced by the disgusted, disappointed look on her father’s face once he saw (if a fish was repulsed, how could he who valued perfection so much be anything less?), the piteous one on the queen’s as she relieved Cass of her duty and passed it to Faith or Myrtle or, ugh, that uppity Judith, the horrified ones on the townspeople's as they skirted around her with all the civility afforded a leper and proceeded to gossip about her 'condition' behind concealing hands once they thought she could no longer hear, and the only surface-level sorry one of Rapunzel’s as she insisted that she had done right in using the bloody incantation before turning her back and going on with her life without her, completely unaware and uncaring as to how she had completely and utterly destroyed Cass’s.

  
Because she had.

She had, and she didn’t even care.

The thought stung worse than the injured arm (and that was saying something), and no matter how she tried to push it aside she couldn’t, because reminders were everywhere, following her like her own personal haunting phantom, from the people whose company she was forced to keep to the knowledge of what she kept hidden under the shining silver armor.

She.

Didn’t.

Care.

Because really, why should she? Cass was just her servant, after all, as _Adira_ (her mind spat the name) had taken sooooo much pleasure in reminding her. And servants were disposable. She was disposable, and would be disposed of the second they got back. The ‘friendship’ she had thought the two of them had shared had turned out to be hollow, nothing more than a shiny toy the princess (another mental spit) had played with and dragged around, Cass filling the role of a favorite doll (spit), until she grew up and chucked her into a storage room to collect dust and moth holes while she went on to other, greater things. The reality of this truth burned a cold, empty hole in her heart that even the raging inferno of anger couldn’t fill, coursing down the ruined arm until it seemed a wonder that the stream didn’t start to boil.

  
A hoot pulled her back and she dragged her gaze back to the bank to behold Owl, now on the grass, peering into the water and leaning so far over the edge he was tempting gravity and a soaking. She groaned at the question, the same one he’d asked in the clearing and every other day since the injury. “Yes, I’m sure it doesn’t need a doctor.” (she swore, sometimes he could be as bad as her dad with worrying over her) “I mean,” she rolled to a sit and pulled the arm, dripping, out of the water, holding it up to the light to inspect it with disgusted eyes (really, she didn’t blame the fish; the thing was gross). “I don’t see any gangrene or anything.” _Yet._

She kicked aside the nagging notion. One thing was working in her favor, and she'd be damned if she ruined it with worry.

Not fully mollified (since he apparently didn’t trust her medical diagnostic prowess), Owl shot her a skeptical glance before ruffling his feathers so he looked like he'd just been blown about by a very impertinent breeze before preening them back in order with stiff, short movements, something time had taught her was a sure sign that he was irritated with her.

  
He was probably right, she was sane enough to admit. With supplies nonexistent after losing the caravan, she hadn't been able to properly tend to it; leaving it to fester unchecked beneath the metal; as it stood, it was nothing short of a miracle there wasn't any further decay of the limb. But she wasn't an idiot or ignorant and knew her luck may only hold for so long. At the very least she should swing by an apothecary for some wrappings and salve (and pain tonic; there was more than one reason she got up early). But that would draw Rapunzel’s attention, inevitably accompanied by more of those pitying looks she hated so much and more assertations that Her Haughtiness had been in the right. If she could avoid that, she would.

Plus, supposing a medic with years of experience at their back reached the conclusion she feared too much to give it more than a passing, quickly squashed thought, that it wasn’t able to be saved? It’d be bad enough returning with a scarred, burned limb; coming home short one was not an option (she could only imagine her dad’s reaction).

  
Everything she’d worked for, wanted, cherished, would be gone. Forever. Because of one terrible, terrible moment. All thanks to…

  
_Rapunzel._

  
The remembrance of _her_ caused Cass to clench her fingers into the semblance of a fist (a pathetic fist that even that sniggering beetle wouldn’t quail at), and realized that the fire that flamed from her effort was no longer an inferno, but dulled to embers. Fine black brows were creased in confusion. _How?_ A glance at the stream provided her answer: having avoided water-based activities most of her life due to an old, old fear of drowning (a fear Rapunzel helped her overcome, back when the princess was new to royal life and had still needed her), she had completely forgotten the unrivaled numbing agent that was ice-cold water.

  
Experimentally, she poked at the stuff that was once skin (ew) and felt only a distant throb; she commanded fingers to curl, and when they did (jerkily and only partway, but it still counted) she almost couldn’t feel their protests.

  
She really should listen to Owl’s advice more often.

With the lessening of pain, the anger dwindled too, allowing Cass, for the first time since sustaining her injury, to think clearly about her situation and all it entailed.

  
And for the first time since the Tree, something that wasn’t anger or pain or despair lit the hazel eyes.

  
Resolve. Determination. A hardening wrought from an iron will. And hope.

  
She eased the gauntlet back on her arm, tasting copper as she bit her tongue lest she free another hiss (the water's magic only went so far), and stood, holding out her good arm as she whistled for Owl to light. Without sparing another glance at the brook, the willows that murmured about the abomination they’d seen, the minnow checking if the coast was clear of demon arms before venturing out again, or the leaf she still swirling in the eddy, she strode back to the clearing where the bow and arrows waited.

  
The leaf couldn’t change its fate, but she could. She could try. She would continue to train without the distraction of pain, ignoring what she could feel of the aches and boils that cried tears of blood at her efforts, taking breaks to numb the arm in the streams they always camped near when the sensations became too much, until she could fight as well as she used to.

And if life was cruel (it usually was) and that arm refused to cooperate? Well, she’d learn to fight with her left (that’s why you had two, after all: so one could step up when the other failed).

  
Because she wasn’t a dead leaf letting a current carry her along, powerless to change things. Maybe she couldn’t stop the gazes or the disheartening look that would fill her father’s eyes upon her return, but she could make their pity be pointless. For who could pity someone who could still soundly beat them in a sparring match?

  
And the princess? She was incorrigible; Cass may as well holler at the sun to not rise and give her an extra hour of sleep. Waiting for her to bend and admit her error and apologize was pointless. But she was still the princess, still Rapunzel, the woman Cass was bound by duty and, she hated to admit, friendship (no matter how meaningless) to protect and serve, something she would continue to do. Because part of not earning pity or disappointment was continuing to fill the role she’d been forced to play, no matter what.

  
She would never give them a reason to cast her aside.

  
No matter what.

**Author's Note:**

> Golly, I just love Cass's character, hard though this was to write; poor girl has enough baggage to fill a freight train.
> 
> I really did not intend for this to get so long; apologies. Even so, I hope you enjoyed the rarity that was me writing for in-canon Cass! If so, please consider leaving a kudos or comment; each and every one is appreciated!
> 
> I have one more idea for a prompt this week (the AU one), but am not sure I'll be able to get it done in time. We'll see, though; if not, I'll definitely post it later (it's a pet idea of mine that I like very much). Until next time!


End file.
